


Do Aliens Go To Heaven? (And Other Philosophical Quandaries)

by Vermin_Disciple



Series: Where No Occult (Or Ethereal) Being Has Gone Before [1]
Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation (Movies)
Genre: Crack Crossover, Eugenics Wars, First Contact, Gen, Humor, Ineffability, Stand Alone, Vulcans, WWIII, Works in this series can be read independently and in any order
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-23
Updated: 2015-08-23
Packaged: 2018-04-16 19:13:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4636974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vermin_Disciple/pseuds/Vermin_Disciple
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"They really do exist, then. Little green men, and all that."</p>
<p>"They're hardly little," said Aziraphale, eyeing one of the aliens warily. "Though I suppose they are a bit green."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Do Aliens Go To Heaven? (And Other Philosophical Quandaries)

"So," said Crowley. 

"Quite," said Aziraphale. 

The little ramshackle pub was lively and crowded. A few feet away, Zefram Cochrane was trying to teach one of the aliens how to dance. She copied his moves with perfect precision and absolutely no expression on her face. Crowley found it unsettling. 

"I take it you didn't know anything about this either, then." 

Aziraphale downed a glass of scotch and immediately poured himself another, before topping up Crowley's glass, a little sloppily. "I did not."

"They really do exist, then. Little green men, and all that."

"They're hardly little," said Aziraphale, eyeing one of the aliens warily. "Though I suppose they are a bit green." 

"You're missing the point," said Crowley, who wasn't entirely sure what the point was. 

"Maybe they're feeling ill. I imagine space travel is hard on the stomach." 

"No, they just have green blood." 

"They _just_ have green blood," repeated Aziraphale, faintly. "How, pray tell, did you discover _that_?"

"I was eavesdropping. They call themselves 'Vulcans.'"

"That seems linguistically unlikely." The 'linguistically' was a little over-enunciated but Aziraphale seemed pleased to have got it out intact. Even angels usually got a bit less friendly with multisyllabic words after that much scotch. 

"You don't think this is, I dunno, some kind of cosmic practical joke? Or a test? Your lot used to go in for that sort of thing."

"If it is, no one informed me." 

Aziraphale was watching the aliens – the _Vulcans_ – nearest them intently. Aside from the eyebrows, the ears, and the slightly greenish tint their skin, they looked more or less human. Such similarities seemed biologically improbable, which probably meant that Ineffability was involved, somewhere. 

"Crowley, I really don't think this is a test. Of them or _us_. They don't—" he searched around for an adequate word, and nearly knocked over the scotch, "— _feel_ right. Surely you've noticed it. They don't feel human. I can't even sense whether or not they have souls." The angel was starting to look a bit green himself. 

"Yeah. I noticed," said Crowley. "So. This is really happening."

"But it _can't_ be. It's not possible."

"How do you explain it, then?"

Aziraphale didn't attempt to explain it. "There's them. And there's us," he said. "Above and Below. There can't be anything _else_ , can there? We would _know_ , wouldn’t we? We were there In The Beginning, as it were."

"You're the one who's always going on about Ineffability. I just hope this doesn’t end in laser-battles-at-dawn. That's the way these things always go down in the films." 

"I do hope not," said the angel. "Not after—well, after _everything_." 

Yes, _everything_. They'd taken to referring to all the recent turmoil that way. After all the effort they'd expended trying to avert the apocalypse engineered by the Powers That Be, it had been dreadful to watch the humans grow their own apocalypse organically, so to speak. The forces of Good and Evil had done it, nominally, for the sake of the eternal salvation/damnation of the human soul. The humans had done it for the sake of making humans _better_. Good and Evil had just sat back and watched. 

Crowley had thought they were done for, and then it had all started slowing down and fizzling out, everyone as depleted of willpower as they were resources. WWIII had ended before the world did. Khan Noonien Singh had disappeared. Everyone was still on edge, waiting for the next explosion, but they were also, slowly, tentatively, beginning to pick up the pieces of the world. And there in the midst of it was Zefram Cochrane, building something new in the ashes. There was that uncrushable spirit of human innovation again, which could be as easily applied to creation as destruction, sometimes both at the same time: neither inherently good nor inherently evil, just inherently human. 

One of the Vulcans was explaining their philosophy of logic to a small crowd of interested spectators. Aziraphale was listening attentively. 

Maybe they didn't have souls, or maybe their souls were too Ineffable for the likes of earthbound angels and demons to sense, but they were certainly doing something to stir the weary human spirit. Crowley didn't need any of his intrinsic powers to feel that. The air practically buzzed with it. That was one of the things he loved about humans; no matter how beaten, downtrodden and demoralized, they were always eager to find new reasons to hope. _Dum spiro spero_ , and all that rot. 

"I don't know about you," said Crowley, a characteristically wicked grin spreading across his face, "but I'm going to go and see whether aliens can be tempted." 

"Did you have anything particular in mind?" asked Aziraphale. He too was beginning to smile, though of course his was beatific. 

"Oh, you know. Thought I'd start with the classics. Avarice, envy, lust – that sort of thing. See if this code of dispassionate logic holds up to a little demonic influence." 

"And I shall of course have to encourage them to generosity, kindness and temperance."

"You're one to talk about temperance," muttered Crowley. Aziraphale ignored him. 

"I rather think I'll have an easier time of it than you. Virtue is obviously more logical than wickedness," said Aziraphale smugly.

"Oh, I don't know about _that_ ," said Crowley, and a pleasant and familiar argument ensued, while all around them, a new world was born.


End file.
